GMU Workshop on AI for Emergency Preparedness in Northern Virginia

Event Details

📅 Date: July 16, 2026

⏰ Time: 9:00 AM – 1:00 PM

📍 Location: 1324 Fuse Building, Mason Square (Arlington Campus: 3351 Fairfax Drive, Arlington, VA 22201)

📍 Parking: For visitor parking, enter "Van Metre Hall Parking Garage" as your destination in your GPS. The garage entrance is located on Founders Way North, off Kirkwood Road, between Fairfax Drive and Washington Boulevard. To validate your parking, use the QR code available at the registration desk (do not use the QR code displayed in the garage). After scanning the QR code, you will be prompted to register your license plate number and credit card information. Your card information is required for app-registration purposes only, and you will not be charged.

Workshop Goal

Northern Virginia faces increasingly complex hazard risks—from flooding and storms to extreme weather and infrastructure-related incidents, posing significant challenges to the coordination of emergency response systems. These hazards can disrupt operations, compromise public safety, and trigger cascading failures across interconnected services and infrastructure. Impacts include reduced response effectiveness, interruptions to economic activity and workforce continuity, supply chain delays, and substantial recovery costs for local governments. When such events necessitate protective actions such as evacuation and sheltering, their social, economic, and safety consequences could extend well beyond the immediate incident.

This workshop brings together stakeholders to identify preparedness gaps and strengthen collaboration across academia, government, and industry. This workshop aims to examine critical challenges facing integrated emergency response systems, with a focus on identifying capacity gaps in preparedness and how and where AI technologies could potential help. Through collaborative discussion and analysis, the workshop will help define both scientific research priorities and operational needs to strengthen resilience across NoVA communities.

Agenda Highlights

08:30 – 09:00: Check-in & Networking

09:00 – 09:05: Welcome

09:05 – 09:50: Panel Discussion: Short and Long-term Challenges in Capacity Building for Regional Coordination

William N. Flagler Jr.

Director

Arlington County Public Safety Communications and Emergency Management

Nora Jackson

Resiliency Planner

Northern Virginia Regional Commission

Courtney Arroyo

Assistant Coordinator for Communications & Community Engagement

Fairfax County Department of Emergency Management and Security

David Povlitz

Fire Chief

Arlington County Fire Department

Dr. Linton Wells II

Executive Advisor

Center for Resilient, Adaptable, and Safe Communities (C-RASC), George Mason University

09:50 – 09:55: BREAK

09:55 – 10:10: Introductions

10:10 – 11:00: Capability Gap Analysis (Regional Coordination for Situational Awareness for Emergency Response Infrastructure - Communications, Transportation, Sheltering, etc.)

11:00 – 11:10: BREAK

11:10 – 12:00: Solutions Discussion (Potential Tools for Interoperability and Communication Processes to Support Decision-Making across Regional Stakeholders)

12:00 – 12:45: Lunch & Roundtables

12:45 – 13:00: Closing and Next Steps

Organizing Committee

Dr. Hemant Purohit, Center for Resilient, Adaptable, and Safe Communities (C‑RASC)
Dr. Luis E. Ortiz, Virginia Climate Center (VCC)
Dr. Julianna Gwiszcz, Institute for a Sustainable Earth (ISE)

Related Works

ISE Catalyst projects - Emergency Preparedness Network and Extreme Heat in Virginia
NSF Smart & Connected Communities project - Resilient Sheltering Decision Support for Emergency Evacuations using Explainable AI
NIST SHIELD-911 project - AI for 9-1-1 Center Training in Fairfax County

Contact